Disorder

by Martha Adele

  I shake my head.

  Logan answers, “No. Yate said that we would get to just hang around wherever today since it is our first day here.”

  “He said that?” Janice smiles at us as if she has a plan in mind.

  We nod.

  “Okay, so I guess that means you guys can come with me if you want. My History Basics class starts in about an hour, and I can go over some of the things we have already learned in there with you guys to help catch you up. After a while, we go to the training room, and I can show you guys the ropes.”

  “Hah!” Mandy lets out a loud and unnecessary chuckle. “You said ‘ropes.’ For the training room.” Mandy turns to Janice and nudges her mumbling. “Get it? That was a pun.”

  The girls at the table behind us all giggle at once. Their voices echo in the room, spooking everyone at our table. I shake it off and ignore Mandy’s laughter at Janice’s unintentional pun. “Will we have to train today or what?” I ask.

  Janice shakes her head. “No. You can if you want to, but we won’t force you.”

  “So …” Logan pauses, seemingly thinking long and hard before he asks a question. We all wait in silence for him to continue. But before he gets the chance, the bell rings overhead, and everyone in the cafeteria scrambles. Janice tells Logan to go ahead, so he clears his throat and speaks up above the chaos around us. “Will this training room help us learn how to fight?”

  Janice leans forward a bit to make it easier to hear. “What do you mean?”

  “Fight,” Logan answers. Our table gets bumped by a passerby, shaking everyone who sits here. Logan slides back onto his seat and looks back to Janice. “How do you figure out who goes to fight and who stays here?”

  Janice glances back to Mandy and tells her to go ahead and head to class. Mandy waves us goodbye and heads off. Janice turns back to us and stands. “Well, before we get that far, you guys definitely need to take some history. And I need to fill you in on everything.” Janice looks from Logan to Mavis to me. “I strongly believe that before you decide to fight for something, you need to know what you are fighting for and why.”

  I know why. The words fall out of my mouth as I rise to my feet. “I need to make sure my mom is safe.”

  Logan and Mavis rise beside me.

  Logan nods in agreement. “And my grandfather.”

  Reaching up to scratch her arm, Mavis stays quiet.

  “All right.” Janice smiles at us. She waves us over to her side of the table, and we follow her out of the cafeteria. “Then I guess we better get started.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  Mavis

  “And here we have Chancellor Meir’s most recent announcement to Bestellen about the series of bombings that happened last night. As you all know, last night’s attacks were the heaviest and strongest attacks we have ever taken on.”

  Janice takes a seat and activates Meir’s last video. Her hologram screen is tinted blue but has other colors, like Meir’s signature wooden desk from where he makes every video. You can see its brown coloring, Meir’s white facial hair and his greased-back equally white hair on the top of his head. Meir wears a brown suit jacket, a light purple vest underneath it, a dark-purple tie that’s almost black tucked into his vest, and a purple scarf that hangs from his neck, serving no real purpose.

  “Good afternoon, Bestellen.” His voice sends a shiver down my spine. Never before have I ever favored him, but everything that has been revealed to me in the last few days hasn’t helped my opinions of him at all. “I am sure you have all been wondering what exactly happened last night that caused all of the noise from outside the wall, and that is why I am here today. Last night, there was an earthquake beyond magnitudes we have ever seen before. Though due to the brilliance of our engineers and workmen, we, the Bestellen government, were able to keep you, our citizens, safe. Our masterfully built walls and protection systems have triumphed once again and kept us all safe from the horrors beyond our borders. Remember, if you don’t fully dedicate yourself to us and your work, your safety will not be possible. Thank you for your dedication, Bestellen. Keep up the good work.”

  The screen freezes on his face, his undeniably smug face. Logan, who sits in front of me, looks back; and Sam, who sits behind me, looks forward. I look to them both as Janice rises again to address the class. She walks over in front of her screen and looks to all of her students, including us. The thirteen others in the room glance over to us every now and then to see how we respond, and every now and then, I glance back at them. They look to be about twelve or thirteen years old and very judgmental. One girl glared at me when she first walked in, as if I had somehow offended her with my presence.

  Janice goes over a few questions with the kids and elaborates on everything extensively. She explains that Meir and his regime keep its citizens uneducated in order to keep them from thinking for themselves. She explains that this doesn’t mean they are stupid; it just means that they have been tricked, all of this time, into believing in a system that is flawed.

  “Sure, every system has its flaws,” she drones. “And yes, no system will please everyone, but this is obviously absurd. If they aren’t being honest with their citizens about something as important as a war, their system is too far gone to revive, not even taking into account all of the other horrendous aspects of their government.”

  The more she explains how Bestellen has been lying to us, the more I want to go and get Derek and his mother. Everything Janice says makes sense. Everything she says she backs up with facts, time lines, and examples. Never before have I had someone actually explain things instead of just forcing me to accept that they were right. By the looks of it, neither has Logan or Sam.

  The three of us are quiet the whole way to the training room. We follow Janice, who follows her thirteen students. The kids are laughing, bumping into one another, skipping, and chatting all the way to our next destination. When we get there, a few of them swing the doors open and go rushing inside while the others casually walk in like they have no real interest in it.

  When we make our way inside, I look around to see a set of what looks like ladders in the air, held up by more ladders to my left and weights, machines, and a few other things that I don’t know how to describe to my right. The kids that came running in run directly to my right toward this line of different obstacles. They separate into two lines and wait behind a bar that comes down to their waist. Whenever two of them finish the course, two more start it. They have to weave through swinging obstacles, jump and duck under still obstacles, climb over walls, jump through things, swing on ropes, climb up more things, jump from ledges to ledges, and try to beat each other to the end without falling.

  To my left, a few of the kids who walked in nonchalantly climb up one set of the ladders and then dangle from the set on top. They swing their arms out and climb horizontally on the ladders and make their way to the other end. The ladder breaks off into two separate paths in the middle. One way, it leads directly to another ladder, while the other leads to a ledge. From that ledge, you can climb down another ladder or swing from a rope to a few other obstacles. This whole room is filled with weights, obstacles, and competition. Though there are a few girls racing through the large obstacle course on the right, the boys seem to be the ones who participate the most.

  A few men and women wearing light-blue collared T-shirts appear from one of the side doors and supervise the kids as they run through the obstacles.

  “Look over there,” Janice chuckles as she watches one of her students dangle from the hanging ladder. The girl giggles as she tries to pull herself up and make it one more bar but drops to the ground trying. All of her friends giggle with her as she falls into the pit below. At first, I expected it to hurt or for someone to show concern, but when the girl hit the ground, the blue floor seemed to engulf her, then spit her back out. The girl stands up and walks off, laughing.

  “Wh
at?” Logan sputters. “What was that?” He points to the girl who just fell twenty feet. “Janice, what happened to the floor?”

  “We came up with a special type of foam flooring that, when hit with a certain amount of pressure, turns into an extremely soft and flexible foam that won’t hurt when you land on it. Then it hardens up the longer you are on it so that you can walk off.” Janice walks over to where the blue flooring starts and walks across it. She turns back to us and holds her arms out. “See?” Janice jumps, and the floor caves in slightly underneath her feet. It hardens and goes back to its flat position almost as quickly as it had become soft.

  Logan walks over and steps onto the blue. Sam and I follow. We all push our feet into it, but it seems just as hard as wood flooring. I jump slightly, but it doesn’t do anything.

  I turn back to Janice and shoot her a confused look, earning a chuckle from her. “Mavis, I think you would need to jump a little higher to get it to do anything.”

  I do. I jump up a little higher and get a very slight softness underneath my feet, but nothing much. Janice gives me a little smile. “It’s because you weigh so little. If you fall from any of our equipment, the force will be enough so that the floor will cushion your fall. So don’t worry. For half of these kids, if they jumped, the floor wouldn’t react either.”

  Logan looks down and jumps, and the floor gives way immediately. Not much, but a lot more than I got. Logan chuckles and looks to Sam.

  “Nope.” Sam shakes his head. “I’m good.” As Sam steps off the foam, I assume he doesn’t want to jump now that Logan has proved it can be dented.

  My attention is caught when I hear a loud thud and a shout. I look back around the room to see a kid dangling from the elevated race obstacle course. The kid catches himself on the bottom of the ledge and tries to pull himself back up after a few seconds of dangling. The kid he was racing runs right by him and finishes the course first, earning cheers from some of his classmates, while the kid who tripped and fell gets laughed at.

  “Do you guys see anything you would like to do?” Janice looks from the kids cheering and jeering back to us. “Anything you would like to try? I don’t know how interested you all would be, but behind that corner, there is a sparring mat for anyone who is interested.”

  Logan shrugs and takes a few steps forward to peek around the corner. Sam and I stay still, looking around the room and observing our surroundings. I quickly find myself looking at a small boy in the corner, behind the air ladders. He looks considerably younger than the rest of the kids and very lonely.

  “Hey.” I nudge Sam and point to the kid in the corner. “Janice, who’s that?”

  Janice glances over to the boy; and before she can answer, she is interrupted by Logan, who walks over to the ladders, where there are no more kids.

  He calls out, “Hey, can I use these?”

  “The monkey bars?” Janice nods. “Sure.”

  Logan wipes his hands on his pants and looks the bars up and down. He places his hands on the first set of bars in front of his face and begins climbing up to the part where there were no more bars except for the ones above him that he would have to climb horizontally. The kids in the room all stop what they are doing to watch Logan. He waits at the top of the bars before grabbing them.

  Logan takes a deep breath, then places his hands on the first bar. Within seconds, he whips across the set and takes a right to the harder path of the monkey bars. He flies through, swinging his arms quickly and powerfully, until he makes it to the ledge. Once he gets to the ledge, he pauses, and stares at the next set of obstacles. The next part is a rope that he is to swing on, straight to a set of metal rings, dangling from chains that lead from one point, to another ledge. Logan takes one more deep breath before launching himself forward. He grabs the rope and swings forward once, backward once, then forward once more. Logan jumps off the rope and grabs on to one of the rings. Almost as fast as he did the regular monkey bars, he swings through the rings.

  From the rings to another ledge. From that ledge to a beam that runs from one ledge to another. Logan crouches and holds out his arms as he quickly skids across the beam to the final ledge, where another ladder leading to the ground waits for him.

  Every kid and adult in the room cheers and claps for Logan as he tries to catch his breath. Every kid except for the kid in the corner, who just smiles at him. Sam and I slow our clapping and watch Logan come down the ladder.

  “Logan!” Janice exclaims. “That was awesome! Have you ever used one of these before?”

  Logan shakes his head and wipes his hands on his pants. “No. Back home, I hung out in the woods a lot. I climbed trees a lot, and I have some friends who tied ropes in the trees to make it easier to get around.”

  Janice nods to him with a smug look on her face. “Ah! Say, how fast do you think you can run?”

  Logan looks to Sam and me as if he is waiting for us to answer. He shrugs back to Janice. “I used to race people back home, but I don’t know the exact speed.”

  “Huh.” Janice smiles and ushers us over to the large and difficult-looking obstacle course. “Would you be interested in trying this out for me?”

  Logan shrugs. “If you want.”

  Janice shakes her head, almost violently. “No, only if you want to.”

  Logan smiles at her and shrugs again. Janice clears the other kids out of the way easily, and we all wait to watch Logan run this next course. I look back to the kid in the corner of the room and see him watching Logan with the rest of us. Unlike everyone else who has gathered around the large course, he remains far away.

  Logan rolls his shoulders back and steps up to the bar, which comes about to his waist. He slowly looks over the whole course and observes it carefully. I can almost hear him counting down in his head as he taps each of his fingers to his thumbs.

  Pointer finger, thumb. Middle finger, thumb. Ring finger, thumb. Pinky, thumb.

  Repeat.

  Logan reaches up to grab the bar in front of him, and he rubs it on the palm of his hands.

  One time.

  Two times.

  Three …

  He swings himself under the pole and through the course. He dodges the swinging obstacles without any thought, ducks under and jumps over the poles and rods he needs to, jumps through hoops, swings on ropes onto ledges, jumps from ledge to ledge, and so much more. He does the whole course seemingly effortlessly and finishes strong.

  All the kids fawn over him. Some cheer, some clap, and others rush over to the course’s start to try to do what Logan just did.

  Janice walks over to Logan with her arms crossed and her smile so overly smug. “Logan, that was very impressive! You know what I think?” She looks around to the kids trying to do what he did. “I think that you are a natural-born Taai.”

  Logan keeps his hands on his hips and takes a few deep breaths, trying to regain his normal breathing pattern. “Taai?”

  Janice nods. “They are our special forces group and are extremely exclusive. They handle special missions that our regular militia is unable to handle.”

  “Missions including swinging from ropes and jumping through hoops?” Logan surmises.

  “Maybe,” Janice chuckles. As Janice and Logan continue to talk about the Taai, Sam elbows me and points over to the kid in the corner. He is just standing there, looking around the room with glasses too big for his face and his arms crossed in a way that makes him look like he owns the place.

  Sam and I make our way over to him, but as soon as the boy realizes that, he averts his eyes from us and keeps them pointed at his feet. Sam and I approach the little blond boy and try to get him to look back to us, but he ignores us.

  “Hey,” I say to him.

  An awkward silence fills the air between the three of us.

  I look to Sam, who has the phrase “I don’t know” painted all over his face
as he shrugs to me.

  “Um … I’m Mavis, and um … this is Sam.”

  The boy nods but keeps his eyes averted from ours.

  I continue, “We’re new here.”

  The boy nods again. “I know. You guys stick out like a sore thumb.”

  “We stick out like a sore thumb?” Sam scoffs. “What about you? You are like half the age of the other students in here.”

  The boy looks around to the others and pauses for a moment. “Yeah, I’d rather be younger than everyone in my class than older.” He looks up to Sam with a worried look in his eyes. “Oh, I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to be rude. It just came out that way. I’m Henry.” He extends his hand to Sam and me, and we give it a shake. “Henry Smalls. And I’m older than half their age. Most people in our class are twelve or thirteen. I am eight.”

  I chuckle. “Okay, Henry. Why aren’t you over there with them on the bars or on the course?”

  Henry pauses and resumes his gaze outward, “The other kids call me weird. I don’t like that, so I don’t train with them.”

  “Why?” I ask. “You don’t seem so weird to me.”

  “I think it’s because I answer most of the questions Ms. Ludley asks.” Henry pushes his glasses back up onto his face using the sides of the frames. “The other kids think I am weird because they aren’t as smart as me.”

  I chuckle again. “Well, that doesn’t sound weird to me. It sounds pretty cool actually.”

  I think back to how we in Bestellen never had any classes to help us prepare for the military; we only had training. The more I think about it, the more I realize that I only went to light training once a week while many others who were assigned to the military went almost every day. I think back to how much I envied the kids in the stories about the other states. How those kids got to go study to be engineers, farmers, lumberjacks, and so many other things.